


Too Close to the Flame (Should My People Fall, Then Surely I'll Do the Same)

by sweeterthankarma



Series: Pride Month Prompts 2020 [3]
Category: Motherland: Fort Salem (TV)
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Bisexual Abigail Bellweather, Bisexual Tally Craven, Developing Relationship, Enemies to Friends to Lovers, F/F, Hurt/Comfort, Post-Season/Series 01, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-03
Updated: 2020-06-03
Packaged: 2021-03-04 03:34:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,341
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24526957
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sweeterthankarma/pseuds/sweeterthankarma
Summary: Orange and black, wisps of smoke, the scent of charcoal and gasoline all brings Raelle back to the past and snaps her forward to the present, to things she doesn’t want to think about. Things she wishes she wasn’t apart of.The Tarim. The Camarilla. The explosion. Losing Tally to Alder’s needs and losing Tally to the helicopter and losing Abigail and losing herself. Losing. Raelle’s life feels like a losing game.
Relationships: Abigail Bellweather/Raelle Collar, Tally Craven/Glory Moffett
Series: Pride Month Prompts 2020 [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1769956
Comments: 26
Kudos: 49





	Too Close to the Flame (Should My People Fall, Then Surely I'll Do the Same)

**Author's Note:**

> Happy Pride Month and welcome to my first ever month-long fic challenge! For thirty days, I'll be writing and posting LGBTQ+ fics inspired by the prompts listed [here](https://www.pinterest.com/pin/517562182177703635/). These fics will be anywhere from 100-1,500 words, will be for different fandoms, ships and characters, and will all stand alone. Here goes nothing!
> 
> Day 3 Prompt: Fire.
> 
> Title comes from the song “I See Fire” by Ed Sheeran.

For months, whenever Raelle is near fire, her stomach aches. Her head pounds. Sometimes she gets nauseous, almost throws up, can feel the room caving in around her, spinning too fast and making her dizzy. The one time that she went to the infirmary over it, some well-meaning nurse labeled it a panic attack and gave Raelle some green nectar and a cool cloth to the forehead before sending her off in the same condition she arrived in. Raelle doesn’t know if there’s any truth to her diagnosis; it’s hard to differentiate her feelings enough to identify them, to separate the good from the bad and the normal from the concerning. Everything starts to blend together. Every day, every month. One tragedy with another, one nightmare with the next.

Post-traumatic stress disorder is normal for soldiers, for witches, for women with generations of trauma and belittlement carried subserviently on their backs. She knows this, and tries to feel better knowing that she can rationalize the way she feels.

It becomes hardly noticeable after a while, this grudging sense of fear that she carries everywhere she goes. Raelle should probably be discouraged by her own complacency but if anything, it’s a relief to just let herself be. She grows used to the pain, the heartburn and jitters and racing thoughts, and forgets that she probably shouldn’t feel nauseous every time she smells smoke, even if it just comes from a grill, dinner shaping up at the mess hall across the fort. The discomfort has become a constant, one more thing to expect on a day to day basis, just like training and classes and drunken Friday nights with her unit. No surprises. Not as of late. She prays to whatever goddesses may or may not exist that things will stay that way. 

The Spree. There’s no way for her not to associate fire with them. Orange and black, wisps of smoke, the scent of charcoal and gasoline all brings her back to the past and snaps her forward to the present, things she doesn’t want to think about. Things she wishes she wasn’t apart of. 

The Tarim. The Camarilla. The explosion. Losing Tally to Alder’s needs and losing Tally to the helicopter and losing Abigail and losing herself. Losing. Raelle’s life feels like a losing game.

She thinks less of Scylla now, less of the way she always smelled like campfire and wood and lavender. Raelle used to like it. It reminded her of home; Scylla used to feel like home. But Raelle understands now that needing something to hold onto doesn’t mean you latch onto the first thing in sight, not even if it’s the prettiest thing you’ve ever seen.

 _You’re a child of haste,_ her father always used to say. He didn’t think it was such a bad thing. Raelle thinks he was wrong, always too kind to her.

It’s not just fire that upsets Raelle, but it’s a pretty big trigger. It’s all around her in the wintertime, warming bodies and souls especially as the holidays come around, and she tries to find the peace in it that other people do, try to see something contained and controlled and harmless. She can’t quite accomplish it. 

Tally, for one, doesn’t mind fire. The heat reminds her of California and Fort Salem is cold in the winter. She’s always shivering and Raelle chides her for it, tells her she needs to get a second meal every night in order to put more meat on her bones. She’s always joking, though. Tally is all muscle, pure strength, inside and out. She’s recovering the best out of all of them. Raelle doesn’t know if she’s surprised by this or not.

Tally stays entertained by Glory nearly every night by the campfire. They’ll hold mittened hands and kiss each other's cheeks and catch snow on their tongues and sip hot chocolate. Tally never cares when she burns her mouth from an overeager, steaming sip, though she’ll make a face that only deepens when Glory laughs at her. No matter how often she call her predictable or sweetly liken her to a child, she never ceases to pull her in closer to her side and stay that way all night. 

Raelle never stays at the campfire for long. The smoke is too much for her. She can’t listen to the crackle of wood and not compare it to the explosion in the desert, the way she felt when her body reverberated against the sand, against the crest of the Earth. When her only crutch was Abigail’s hand in hers, grounding her through the unknown. 

Abigail hasn’t stopped grounding her since. Eleven weeks since they moved into the War College sector of the Fort and Abigail is still there, adamant at Raelle’s side and helping her undo every single knot she ties herself up in. She doesn’t condone, only coaxes, and keeps checking up on her out of kindness rather than wanting to be right, wanting Raelle to owe her. 

On the night before Christmas Eve, Abigail conjures flames up between her slim fingers, something Raelle didn’t even know was possible. Raelle comes close to her, remarkably unafraid, and Abigail balances her gaze between Raelle’s expression and the sight below her. She watches the flames move, lick at the air, follow her commands. Her eyes widen like she can’t believe it’s a true manifestation of her own doing. 

Raelle’s breathing doesn’t quicken as she watches it. The flames dance and dare to reach out far past Abigail’s palms, to her, and she lets them try it, doesn’t back up when the hem of her shirt gets warm. Abigail won’t let her get burnt. She knows this so innately, the way she knows her own name. 

“My mom taught me this yesterday,” Abigail says quietly. “Considered it a gift. Thought I could use it in combat.”

Raelle reaches out to touch Abigail’s forearm. Her fingers touch the stretch of skin between her wrist and her elbow, faintly heated from the fire but otherwise cool from the previous time spent outside. Massachusetts serves up a bitter cold unlike anything either of them have ever experienced.

“It doesn’t burn you?”

Abigail gives a slight shake of her head. “It doesn’t scare you?” she asks in return.

“Surprisingly, no.” She watches Abigail turn the fire over in her hands, move it from one palm to the other. “I think I’m okay because it’s you.”

Six months ago, Raelle would have never admitted this aloud, never have said a word that would have given Abigail even the slightest hint that she thought she was anything but a snobby, entitled High Atlantic priss. She’s a different person than she was six months ago. They both are.

Abigail extinguishes the fire with a wave of her hands and a low whisper. She looks at Raelle for a long moment, the air between them wavering from the now dissipated magic that had existed in its space. They reach for each other’s hands at the same moment. 

The warmth, no longer visible, is palpable. It rises up through Raelle’s body, filling her, like a burst of energy. Everywhere Abigail touches her brings goosebumps to her skin and heat to her veins, the best kind, the kind she isn’t afraid of. 

She’s kissed Abigail a few times since...everything. They should probably talk about it, what it means, _if_ it means anything. They never do. 

They’ve never gone further than just touching each other like this, never taken off more than their sweaters in their time alone. It’s different now, though, with the remnants of the fire amplifying Abigail’s touch, soothing Raelle’s worries. This means something, is something that no onlooker could ever fully understand the depths of. It’s more than wandering hands, more than an embrace. Raelle feels herself healing. Abigail watches it happen.

Raelle spends nearly every night for the rest of the winter at Tally and Glory’s campfire, with Abigail steady by her side. She doesn’t recoil at the smell of smoke anymore.

**Author's Note:**

> Come say hi and celebrate pride month with me on Tumblr [here.](https://sweeterthankarma.tumblr.com/)


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